Patience is a Virtue

Saturday, 16 July 2016

A few people, or as I like to call them, impatient bastards, have been asking me when they'll be taking delivery of their hauki.

The sort answer is: when I've finished writing them.

The slightly longer answer goes like this.

I wasn't expecting the book to be funded within a month, I thought it would take 3 or 4 at least, so I had always penciled in this autumn for completing the book. I have lots of haiku written already, of course, but I want to revist and refine those and I do need to write a fair few new ones. I hope to have all of that done by the end of September.

Once they are complete, and a few trusted friends have read them and offered feedback, then I can hand over the manuscript to my lovely colleagues at Unbound and they'll get cracking with the production side of things. This can take a while so I suspect we'll be looking at next summer before finished books will plop through your eager letterboxes.

I hope that is OK.

In the meantime, I am off to the Isle of Wight next week for our family holiday. A fortnight in one of my favourite places. I'll be offline the entire time so this will give me the opportunity to add to the haiku pile. Expect poems about stepping back in time, coloured sands and fossils.

And at the end of August I flee the country and head off to New Zealand for a month. I have been invited to speak at two literary festivals—WORD Christchurch and the National Writers' Forum—at either end of four weeks. I want to do more writing while I am there. Expect poems about Airbnb apartments, kiwi fruit and rugby.

So hopefully by the time I get back I'll have a notebook full of haiku and we'll be ready to roll.

Thanks for your patience. Unless you are one of the impatient bastards.

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Anyone For Cake?

12 pledges

Scott will bake you a banana, hazelnut and birch syrup loaf cake, which is one of his own recipes, plus you get a signed first edition of the hardback plus the ebook and your name in the back of the book. (UK only)

A Haiku on the Tiles

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Scott's wife is the ceramicist, Rhian Winslade. She will create a series of porcelain tiles, each decorated with one of the haiku from the book, created using letters from an antique printing kit. Each tile will be unique and a genuine one-off.

Vaughan Oliver Cover Art

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A limited edition, numbered giclée art print of the book's cover art, designed by Vaughan Oliver. Both Vaughan and Scott will sign the print, plus a signed first edition of the hardback plus the ebook and your name in the back of the book Only 10 available

Editorial Review
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Masterclass

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Scott will visit your writing group and present his masterclass on How to Pitch Your Book to Agents and Publishers. This informative and entertaining class will teach you everything from how to identify the right publisher or agent, to how to write a killer synopsis and cover letter. Scott has presented this class twice in the past year as part of the acclaimed Guardian Masterclass series. This reward comes with up to 10 copies of the book and your name in the back of the book.